Concrete Angel
by Ari-Griffin
Summary: A song fiction about Helga's life at fifteen.


I do not own Hey Arnold or the lyrics to Concrete Angel. Martina McBride  
sings Concrete Angel. If you haven't heard it yet, I suggest you call your  
local country music station and request it.  
  
"I'm fifteen years old," Helga Pataki thought as she opened her eyes. The  
sun streamed through her window, and, for one magical moment, lit the room  
up in a dazzling array of colors. Helga smiled and sat up. She gently taped  
the crystal she had hung up near her window and watched as the colors  
danced around her. Everything was perfect.  
"Olga! Get down here now!" Helga grimaced at the sound of her father's  
gruff yell.  
"It's Helga, Bob! H-E-L-G-A," she yelled back. The sound of someone  
hurriedly climbing the stairs filtered through the house. Bob threw open  
the door to Helga's bedroom and rushed in. He lumbered over to her bed and  
roughly picked her up.  
  
"I don't care what your name is, Girl! Get down stairs pronto," He said as  
he shook her. He then dropped her onto the floor and left the room.  
Helga picked herself up off the floor. She walked to her closet and looked  
for something to wear. Finding nothing, she walked over to her dirty  
clothes hamper and pulled out the dress she wore the day before.  
She got dressed carefully, so she wouldn't touch the tender bruises on her  
arms and back.  
Helga grabbed her book bag and rushed downstairs. She entered the kitchen,  
only to find her mother asleep on the counter with an empty bottle of Jack  
Daniels in her hand. Helga sighed. She had given up on her parents years  
ago.  
Helga opened the refrigerator and took out a sandwich she had made the  
night before. She placed it in her lunch box along with a half empty bottle  
of yahoo and a bag of stale chips. She put her lunch box into her book bag  
and grabbed a pack of crackers. She walked out of the apartment, eating the  
crackers, carefully shutting the door. She choked back tears as the bus  
passed her by. She watched her feet as she walked to school.  
  
'She walks to school with the lunch she packed,  
Nobody knows what she's holdin back,  
Wearin the same dress she wore yesterday,'  
  
Helga opened the door to her Honors English class. She was late. She pulled  
the sleeves on her dress down to hide her bruises. Her teacher, Mrs. Young,  
glanced at her as she took her seat in the front row. She wondered why  
Helga was late and why she kept pulling her sleeves down, but she decided  
not to question her. Instead, she continued with the day's lesson.  
  
'She hides the bruises with a linen and lace ohhh,  
The teacher wonders but she doesn't ask,  
It's hard to see the pain behind the mask,  
Baring the burden of a secret storm,  
Sometimes she wishes she was never born,'  
  
Helga put her binder and textbooks back into her locker. She walked to the  
lunchroom and sat at an unoccupied table. She looked over to the table  
where her beloved, Arnold, sat with his arms around another girl. She  
looked back at her half eaten sandwich. Her mind drifted. In her dream, her  
family loved her, she was popular, and Arnold loved her.  
  
'Through the wind and the rain she stands hard as a stone,  
In a world that she can rise above,  
But her dreams give her wings and she flies to a place where she's loved,  
Concrete angel,'  
  
Helga trudged home from the docks; the streetlights had been on for over an  
hour. As soon as she opened the door, Big Bob was on her case.  
At half past eleven, Helga climbed the stairs to her room, with more  
bruises on her arms and a growing one across her face. She flung open her  
closet door and fell to her knees in front of her Arnold shrine, sobbing.  
As she wiped her tears away, she remembered the knife she kept behind her  
shrine. She reached behind the base and pulled the dagger out. She stood up  
and walked to her bed. Helga cried as she laid down. She brought the blade  
up and quickly brought it down into her chest. Outside her window, a lone  
dove took flight.  
  
'Somebody cries in the middle of the night,  
The neighbors hear but they turn out the light,  
A fragile soul caught in the hands of fate,  
When morning comes it will be too late,'  
  
Sixty years after Helga's death, a lone man stared at a headstone. He took  
his cane and moved the grass in front of it away. He slowly read the words  
aloud.  
'Through the wind and the rain she stands hard as a stone,  
In a world that she can rise above,  
But her dreams give her wings and she flies to a place where she's loved  
Concrete angel'  
Helga Geraldine Pataki  
March 25th 1987- March 25th 2002  
"Oh, Helga! I loved you," the man said. He turned when he heard a cough  
from behind him. There stood a football headed old man with a walker and a  
bouquet of red, pink, and white roses.  
Brainy turned back around and sobbed. Arnold walked to stand beside Brainy.  
He looked at Brainy and he too started to cry.  
"Happy Birthday, Helga," Arnold choked out. He laid the bouquet in the arms  
of the angel statue above the grave. Brainy and Arnold looked once more at  
her grave and turned to leave.  
"Thank you," the wind whispered into their ears. They smiled as they walked  
back to their families.  
  
'A statue stands in a shaded place,  
An angel girl with an upturned face,  
Her name is written on a polished rock,  
A broken heart that the world forgot,  
Through the wind and the rain she stands hard as a stone,  
In a world that she can rise above  
But her dreams give her wings and she flies to a place where she's loved,  
Concrete angel' 


End file.
